Save him
by J.A.Kishu
Summary: After a wild party medicine student John Watson meets a woman who tells him to save someone. The next day John goes to find the mystical adress on a paper he found in his coat. Same universe as "Guardian angel". No work order
1. Meeting in the darkest hour

**Save him**

 **Chapter 1: Meeting in the darkest hour**

The last year of your university-time often gave you the feeling you had to do so many things before you could then start with your life as a responsible adult. Not that John would ever do things he would ever regret.

That's the reason John let Mike talk him into the party where he is right now. More drunk then he had been through the course of the whole year and already feeling the hangover that would come to him in the morning or better later in the day.

As the least drunk person it was his responsibility to make sure Mike found his way into his bed without major accidents. The nearly falling into the Thames didn't count; their clothes were after all still dry.

After having left Mike at his flat and on the way home the world around John started to spin, okay spin more than before and as his vision got blurry. He sat down on a bench not 300 meters away from his flat for a short break. Leaning against the cold wood John closed his eyes in the hope the world would have stopped spinning when he reopened his eyes.

It was actually the case, it was still a bit blurry on the corner of his vision but things were not turning anymore. John looked around, he had no idea how long he had already been sitting there but as he observed his surroundings he saw a women under one of the street lights, walking in his direction. He couldn't see her clearly but he was sure she was beautiful with long blond hair. She was wearing a white dress with some kind of scarf around her neck that lay on her back, floating lightly in the wind. It gave the impression she was wearing wings, John thought in his drunken state. Smiling dumbly, an angel he thought laughing quietly to himself.

The woman came closer walking elegantly over the path. She stopped in front of John so that he had to look up to see her face. Her eyes were warm, eyes that had seen the world. The good and the bad parts. She didn't smile or maybe just a little bit, John couldn't see it. It was as if the street lights had become brighter, there was more light around him and subconsciously John knew this light was coming from the angel-like woman.

She bent down to him, close, too close for him to see anything else but her blue eyes. Her very serious but also clear words touched John's ears, his mind and his soul in a way he did not understand.

"Save him. You have to save him. Because one day you will meet him again and you will need him more than you are able to imagine right now. So go and save him."

John didn't understand this request, he was always happy to help people but who should he be saving now? And where? And when? The woman rose up and put a piece of paper in his coat pocket. Confused he looked up to her but she had already turned to leave.

"Go home and sleep." Were the last words he heard from her.

Deciding that this was indeed a good idea, John got up and walked the last meters to his home. He tried to not further think about the woman, her words or the strange persisting feeling in his body that these words were the only truth he would ever get from her. Falling into his bed without making an effort of changing out of his clothes, John fell asleep the next second.


	2. The forgotten message

**Chapter 2: The forgotten message**

The sound of John's alarm clock was sharp and tedious like always but with the alcohol from the last night it was more difficult to get up. The next lecture was waiting. John got up, stripped from his wrinkled clothes and threw them on the floor. His room was already a mess anyway and one or two items more would make no difference. He would tidy up later or the next day.

The shower did the usual miracle when he drank too much. The hot water on his skin washed away all the smell and sweat, relaxed his muscles and the short cold stream cleared his head. John Watson was ready for a new day. Still drying himself he got a little shock as he saw the time. Dressed and ready in less than a minute John was out of the door with an open shirt and coat in his hand. When he reached the bottom of the stairs he was suitably dressed for the day.

John walked down the road; his flat was a ten minutes footway away from the science building. He wouldn't have needed to hurry with his dressing, he wouldn't be late. He was never late. As John put his hands into his pockets to warm them up a bit he felt a piece of paper. He never put pieces of paper in his coat, why should he and why had he done it this time? Then he remembered the party of the previous night. Maybe he had gotten lucky and the paper slip contained the number of a girl. But what he read on the paper confused him. It was only an address and the words 'SAVE HIM' in capital letters. He turned the paper to look on the other side but there was nothing. Only the address of a building in one of the not quite so good parts of the city. The parts his parents had said he should avoid.

Slowing down his pace John tried to remember who had given him this address. It wasn't at the party, he was certain about that. But that meant it must have been given to him somewhere and sometime on his way home. Probably somewhere between Mike's and his flat. There was a flash of a picture of a woman in his head but it disappeared quickly and left a strange feeling back that John couldn't describe. It was as if someone was calling his name and for the first time since he had started studying medicine he would miss a class. He turned at the next corner to go to the nearest subway station to catch the next train which would bring him closer to the address on the paper.

As John left the station it was as if he were entering another city. The buildings where old, dirty and most of them need a serious renovation. His parents were right that this part of the city should be avoided but this station was the closest one to the address. He walked down the street staying away from dark corners or alleys ("you don't have to take more risks than necessary" he told himself). The streets were empty. No one was on their way to a station to get to work; no old ladies were on their way to do the shopping. John was alone on this not so early morning. The address was the one of an old, empty looking house with a sign on the door that said 'keep out'.

John didn't know much about the lower classes of London or the drug scene in general but this 'house' just about shouted DRUG DEN. John stood in front of the house not sure if he should go inside. He didn't really know why but he kept hearing the same two words in his head that had lead him so far again and again: SAVE HIM!

"Fine, I will have a look." Mumbling to himself he climbed over the broken gate and rounded the house to find a way in. A way many had used before him. One of the windows was broken and all bits of broken glass had been removed. John pulled himself up and climbed through it without any witnesses. Not that the neighborhood really told a story about there being alert neighbors.

To John's surprise and a bit to his joy the ground floor was empty (no one jumped at him). He looked in every room, even opened a cupboard to make sure. He eyed the suspicious looking stairs but after testing the first two he steps he climbed the rest without hesitation, searching the upper floor.

In the last room at the end of the hall he found something and honestly John's first thought was that he had found a body. Not that it would be his first one as a medicine student. You got your fair share of dead bodies before they let you treat a living person. In the corner of the room on an old mattress laid something small covered with a dirty blanked and not moving. After the first shock was somewhat over John walked into the room leaving the door open as an escape route should he need one. The floor made creaky noises but whatever lived in that room (if it was still alive) was not moving. The same words came again to his mind demanding attention. "Save him." Maybe it was already too late.

John kneeled next to the dirty and smelly mattress reaching with his hand for the blanket and lifting it up slowly. What he found surprised him. It was not same old homeless man or a drugged adult. It was just a child. Not really a child but a teenager. Maybe fifteen or sixteen but not older. The boy lay there totally still, like dead, not moving. John laid his fingers on the boy's neck to feel for a pulse. He never got the chance as a boney hand grabbed his wrist and held it with amazing strength. Not moving but with wild eyes looking around the room until they focused on him.

"Did David send you or my brother?" Not even waiting for the surprised John to catch his breath or think about an answer, the boy started to shout. "Answer me. Who sent you? What did they tell you?" John could see how the boy's eyes started to lose their focus. Eyes like the stormy sea. At that point his medical training kicked in.

"No one sent me." Not really true but you didn't tell that to someone who was obviously paranoiac and was having a panic attack. "I was just in the neighborhood and found you. You look like you need help." His pupils were bigger than they should be in the bright room, it looked like the boy was sweating heavily and John could manage to feel his pulse with a bit of twist of his arm. It was too fast; not good. The kid probably had overdosed on some kind of drug, he needed to bring him to a hospital before something happened.

"Don't believe you. You work for my brother, he has sent a doctor to make sure I won't die on the way back to my 'nice little cell' in the rehab center. Tell him he can have my room, he is the addict with all his cake eating but no one judges him. It's always only me." The last words came out a bit more self-pitying than the boy had intended them to be. John could see that.

Smiling a soft smile he answered the boy with all the patience he could muster. "I won't call your brother, because I don't know him or any David. I am trying to help you. You are right about the medical education but I'm still only a student and no one would send me here to get someone with a drug overdose out of here. Believe me. But we should think about your staying here. You can't stay forever and you know that." The boy was very still and listened to John's words. He was probable searching for a lie in John's words. "How about I bring you to the next hospital and we tell no one who you are. They have to help you and I can't tell them your name because I don't know it." John really hoped that was enough, he couldn't do much here.

"Fine. But you have to help me, my legs won't work in the state I'm in." Surprised by the fast change John stood up and pulled the boy with him. He was light, a bit smaller than himself and dangerously thin. But this was something for later. John pulled one of the boy's arms over his shoulder to support him as they walked to the stairs with surprisingly few problems but the stairs would be a different story. Looking down at the shaky legs of the boy John realized there was only one way to do this.

"I will carry you down the steps, it's safer and easier for both of us." The boy looked as if he wanted to protest but he kept his mouth shut. John bent down a bit, put one of his arms under the knees of the boy and lifted him up. Instinctively the boy held himself in place by laying his other arm around John's neck, his head finding a place on John's shoulder.

Watching him the boy closed his eyes nearly giving John a panic attack but the boy kept breathing even if a bit too fast. Wondering about the window and how to climb through it John saw that the door was not locked from the inside. He could have used it to get in as well.

The sleeping/unconscious boy safe in his arms John made his way down the road. The next hospital wasn't far away. No one stopped him as he entered the clinic building and saw people again. No one questioned his story that he had found the boy around the corner and hadn't been able to wake him up.

After they had taken the boy away for treatment John could feel some weight being lifted from him. Not the physical weight, more the buzzing in his head which had stopped. First he thought about waiting for the boy but after the nurse told him he could go (probably used to drug cases) he left. The boy wouldn't want him there and maybe he wouldn't even really remember him.

Outside the building he turned around and looked over the roof to see the sky. For a short second he thought there was someone standing on the edge but after he looked again there was nothing. Just his imagination. Now he needed an excuse for missing his class.


	3. First meeting or reunion

**Chapter 3: First meeting or reunion**

'Nothing ever happens to him' it was true and not in a good way. John was back from Afghanistan and alone. He couldn't go to Harry and ask her for help. All his friends were still part of the Army or dead. John couldn't decide what was worse. He soul had gone lost somewhere between that hot day when a bullet had touched him and arriving back home. Although home was not the way he felt for London anymore. The weather was always bad, dark like his mood. His flat, if that was what you wanted to call a one-room apartment, was depressing. All this did not help with his own depression and the worst part was that his gun was looking more attractive every day.

John was still here, he hadn't eaten his gun the previous night. The heavy piece of metal lay safe in his desk drawer. Where it belonged except if he changed his mind later in the day. It wouldn't change, nothing ever changed in his life. He had never thought that a simple call of his name would change everything.

Mike, good old Mike, had a bit more around his hips but still smiling like in the old days was the first one he talked to in a long time. Doctors and psychologist didn't count; they got paid for talking with you. Like shop keepers, your landlord and the guy who drove the taxi. John didn't want to talk to him at first but he followed his old friend to St. Bart's to meet with someone he had never met for a potential flat share. Ridiculous. As if this person would just stand up and say "hey yes lets share a flat". "Stop being so sarcastic", he ruffled himself.

The outside of the building hadn't changed much, only the inside. New labs now with modern equipment and everywhere young people full of dreams and hope and a future. "Don't be so negative, John, maybe he is a nice guy who can't afford a flat in London like you. Although he better not be like you."

The man they met was nothing like John had imagined. The short look into his eyes let spark something familiar in John as if he had met him before. But a man like that would have left an imprint he couldn't have forgotten. For the first time in ages he felt deep inside his soul a connection to another person. Strange because he had only met him ten seconds before but somehow he knew this stranger could be trusted. He could trust him.

This unexpected meeting lead to a friendship that probably saved his life not that John would ever tell a single soul that he had been on the way home to kill himself. Sometimes he suspected that Sherlock did have an idea of what he had stopped that day. Maybe that was the reason for his behavior during their first meeting. He would never know.

He was thinking back at that day and smiling as he and Sherlock walked through the park to get a late dinner at Angelo's.

"Why are you smiling like that?" Sherlock asked as he caught John smiling by a look to his side. Eyes like the stormy sea John thought not to the first time.

"Nothing, just looking forward to our dinner." He was still smiling as they walked together into their favorite restaurant.

The skinny teenager with the drug overdose was only a vague shadow in his memory, nearly forgotten after fifteen years of life. Like the angel that had saved them both.


End file.
